JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has a simple message as he seeks a third term in office - he is a strong man and a vote for him at parliamentary elections on January 22 means Israel will be a powerful nation. The Hebrew word for strong, "hazak", peppers the television adverts of his right-wing Likud-Yisrael Beiteinu party like a compulsive mantra and is smeared across the blue-and-white campaign posters that dominate billboards around the country. Robust...

Parents rarely beam with pride at the thought of Junior's first text, but it's as inevitable as baby's first word in the age of smartphones. When should the age of smartphone acquisition be? A survey commissioned by Zact, a no-contract smartphone service that allows parents to customize voice, text and data access for their children's devices, asked that question of more than 1,000 parents. About 16 percent of parents chose ages 8 to 11; 22 percent...

In seeking a Solomonic approach to its relationship with gay individuals, the Boy Scouts of America has chosen to slice the baby in half. By allowing gay children to be scouts, but severing the association between the organization and homosexual adults, a troubling question arises: Are adult homosexuals presumed to be pedophiles, or is a value judgment being made that the gay child develops into an adult that is not a worthy and equal human being?...

BEVERLY HILLS, California (Reuters) - Leave it to the prolific filmmaking pair Joel and Ethan Coen to create their own movie conundrum, and engineer (or maybe luck) their way out of it. For their new film, "Inside Llewyn Davis," the brothers Coen painted themselves into this corner: They needed an actor for the title role of a struggling folk singer in the early 1960s who could carry an entire movie, be in every scene, convince the audience he was a musician...

Simon says. Simon denies. That contradiction is the most perplexing conundrum to come out of the investigation into allegations of abuse and of involvement in skate tampering made against U.S. short track speedskating head coach Jae Su Chun. The executive summary of the investigation by the New York-based law firm, White & Case, released Friday, says Simon Cho alleged the coach had first asked him and another U.S. skater, Jeff Simon, to damage a Canadian's skate...

Born to a mother in prison, 15-year-old Davion Only has been in foster care all his life. Last month he walked into a church in St. Petersburg, Fla., and pleaded for a family of his own. "I'll take anyone," Davion said. "Old or young, dad or mom, black, white, purple. I don't care. " He had the congregation in tears. He also caught the attention of a Tampa Bay Times reporter, who told his story so compellingly, it became national news. On Monday, the boy appeared on multiple talk...

If only Carol Moseley Braun had learned and grown in the years since charm propelled her into the history books. If only she could show that her mistakes had made her wiser. If only she had evolved into the effective politician so many former fans once dreamed she could be. If only all of that, there wouldn't be so many people now dismayed that a small team of black Chicago powerbrokers has anointed Braun as their candidate for mayor. Forget for now...

By Jeremy Wagstaff and Devidutta Tripathy SINGAPORE/NEW DELHI, Sept 6 (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp's acquisition of Nokia's handset business gives the software behemoth control of its main Windows smartphone partner, but leaves a question mark over the bigger business it has bought: Nokia's cheap and basic phones that still dominate emerging markets like India. Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer has said he sees such phones - of which Nokia shipped more...

Nicolas Cage is in the middle of one of those slow burns he usually reserves for his on-screen personas. His eyes widen as he relives a recent run-in with an angry motorist, and his histrionics at one point become so intense he has to smooth out what has now become a ruffled black suit. As Cage tells it, he was stuck in one of those infamous Los Angeles traffic jams with his young son, Weston, when some guy "who was about 350 pounds and said he had just gotten out of prison" began hurling a string of...

(Reuters) - The Champions League risks being thrown into confusion after Ukrainian side Metalist Kharkiv were kicked out of the competition on Wednesday but still had the option of taking their case to sport's highest tribunal. Turkish club Fenerbahce, banned from European football for two years over domestic match-fixing, have already been re-admitted to the contest while they await the result of an appeal at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). If Metalist follow a similar...

The Cubs have won 8 of their last 12 games since June 26, a streak roughly coinciding with the beginning of their long-anticipated fire sale. Carlos Marmol, Scott Feldman, Steve Clevenger and Scott Hairston are gone, with Shawn Camp designated for assignment and on his way out. But that's opened the door for Carlos Villanueva, Dave Sappelt and others to step up while getting their opportunities. The bullpen has been revamped, and even the loss of hot hitting Ryan Sweeney hasn't...

9 p.m., WBBM-Ch. 2 The team learns that a wealthy investment banker who was found murdered inside his locked safe room was living a dual life and skimming millions of dollars from his clients. Patrick (Simon Baker, right) sets up a mental conundrum to see which of the suspects will show his true colors.

In seeking a Solomonic approach to its relationship with gay individuals, the Boy Scouts of America has chosen to slice the baby in half. By allowing gay children to be scouts, but severing the association between the organization and homosexual adults, a troubling question arises: Are adult homosexuals presumed to be pedophiles, or is a value judgment being made that the gay child develops into an adult that is not a worthy and equal human being?...

Condoms, not to be confused with condominiums, which tend to be larger and, some say, more comfortable, have lately become a conundrum for people who contemplate using them for the purpose of preventing death. One thing people do know is that the plural of conundrum is conundrums, not conundra or any other hopelessly Latinate construction. They know that from Fowler's "Modern English Usage," which concedes that no one really knows where the word conundrum came from. The origin of condom is...

(John Lloyd is a Reuters columnist but his opinions are his own.) By John Lloyd May 28 (Reuters) - For the giants of Silicon Valley, the fall from freedom's children to social pariah has been something of a Shakespearean reversal of fortunes. Google, Apple and Facebook might be Lear, Othello and Macbeth in the suddenness and completeness of their fall from a grace that was bequeathed to them by the generations that found their technologies liberating, empowering and even beautiful.